CD museum Pb

Get Yourself Together, Yesterday’s Papers, Sometimes Happy Sometimes Blue (early version), Old King Cole (early version of We Love You), Child Of The Moon, Jumping Jack Flash, Pay Your Dues (early version of Street Fighting Man), Stray Cat Blues, Parachute Woman, Factory Girl, Dear Doctor, No Expectations, You Got The Silver, While Horses #1, Sister Morphine, Gimme Shelter, Loving Cup, Dead Flowers, Bitch, Brown Sugar, Wild Horses #2
There have been a glut of Rolling Stones outtakes being released of late, and Got To Be Worked On! on Rover Records is a competent collection. The sound quality varies depending on the source, but they are all very good to excellent sounding, professionally recorded outtakes. Some of the tracks sound rather hissy, although this is due to the original source material.

The first track on this collection is an unreleased song called “I Can See It (aka Get Yourself Together).” It was recorded in August, 1966 during the Between The Buttons sessions and overdubbed in November. The sound quality is excellent but a bit hissy. With the fuzz on the guitar and bombastic drums, it sounds like the Stones trying to imitate the Kinks. The following two songs date from the same sessions and are basic run throughs of “Yesterday’s Papers” and an early version of “Dandelion.” “Old King Cole” is an instrumental rehearsal for the song “We Love You.”

“Child Of The Moon” was recorded in March, 1968 and this is an alternate mix of the final product. “Jumping Jack Flash” is from the promo film recorded on April 27th, 1968 and comes straight from the video. This version is much more raw than the final and includes extra “whoops” at the beginning. “Street Fighting Man” an instrumental version recorded in February 1968 at Keith Richards’ home under the title “Primo Grande.” The first attempts in the studio were a month later at Olympic Studio. The first instrumental run through was again referred to as “Primo Grande.”

The first attempt at recording it with lyrics was at the same sessions under the title “Pay Your Dues” and features Nicky Hopkins on piano, Dave Mason on shenhani, Rick Grech on electric violin and backing vocals provided by Jim King and Roger Chapman. The only difference in the instrumental arrangement between this and the commercial version is the lack of violin. The original lyrics are quite strange and the chorus says, “Now did everybody pay their dues? / Now did end up with tribal blues? / All the braves and squaws and the maids and the whores / Did, everybody pay their dues?”

“Stray Cat Blues” dates from Olympic Studio on April 3rd, 1968. This is a early alternate mix with additional vocals and louder bass and lead guitar. “Parachute Woman” comes from a session on March 25th, 1968, and this track is an early mix of the second take with double tracked vocals. both “Factory Girl,” “Dear Doctor,” and “No Expectations” originate from the same sessions in May, 1968 at Olympic Studio.

“Factory Girl” is a take different from the Beggar’s Banquet version and features Rick Grech on fiddle, Rocky Dijon on congas and Dave Mason on mandolin. The fiddle is mixed differently. “Dear Doctor” is the first take with different lead vocals than the commercial version. “No Expectations” begins with Keith speaking to Stu before the song begins. This outtake appears on Time Trip and other titles, but Rover have a version lasting four minutes twenty-one seconds and contains the final verse which are omitted from other titles.

“You Got The Silver” comes from February 16th, 1969 and this is the ubiquitous take with Mick on vocals. The first of two takes of “Wild Horses” on Got To Be Worked On! was recorded in December, 1969 at Olympic Studio and is a remix of the Shelly version of the song but without piano.

“Sister Morphine” is the third version of the song recorded at Olympic in March 1969 (and not 1968 as mentioned in the liner notes). The following track “Gimme Shelter” comes from the sessions as “Sister Morphine” and this is the popular take from March 15th that features Keith on vocals, Nicky Hopkins on piano and Jimmy Miller on percussion.

There also are no backing vocals as on the final track. “Loving Cup” comes from the Olympic Studio sessions from April 17th to July 2nd, and this take features a different piano introduction. “Dead Flowers” comes from a session on April 24th, 1970 at Olympic Studios and this take is the commercial version but with a slightly different mix. “Bitch” was recorded in late October 1970 at Stargroves with the Mobile Record Unit and mixed at Olympic Sound soon afterwards. This is the second version which is the one used on Sticky Fingers but with a different mix.

“Brown Sugar” was recorded at Muscle Shoals in Alabama several days before the concert at Altamont. This is the second version (“Decca acetate”) which has no saxophone and Ian Stewart playing piano. Finally, this take of “Wild Horses” dates from the same time and place as the preceding track. This features Jim Dickinson on tack piano and this tape was given as a demo to Gram Parsons.

Besides the complete “No Expectations,” there isn’t much on here that hasn’t been featured on many other releases. The title is packaged in a standard jewel case with the artwork printed on glossy paper with black and white photographs of the band in the studio. There are detailed notes for each track giving reasonably accurate information concerning the song’s origin which is a plus. Overall this isn’t a bad summary of Stones outtakes for those who don’t have this material elsewhere.